Benedict says God told him to resign the papacy

Benedict with Francis, his successor. He now says his resignation was by divine order.Associated Press

Benedict XVI now says he resigned the papacy in February not for reasons of health but because God told him to do so.

The 86-year-old says the instruction was communicated to him during a months-long "mystical experience," one that didn't involve an apparition or the hearing of God's voice but that left him with an "absolute desire" to dedicate himself exclusively to prayer.

The comments by the former pontiff, said to have been made a few weeks back, were reported by the Catholic news agency Zenit and published Wednesday in the British newspaper the Guardian.

"The report seems credible. It accurately explains the spiritual process that brought Benedict to resign," a senior Vatican source told the Guardian.

The noteworthy charism of his successor, Pope Francis, has confirmed Benedict in the rightness of his decision, according to the reports.

In announcing his resignation on Feb. 11, Benedict told the cardinals that "my strengths, due to an advanced age, are no longer suited to an adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry."

At the time, a German journalist who had recently met Benedict speculated he was going deaf, noted that he seemed to be blind in one eye and remarked on his thinness and apparent exhaustion.

Benedict, who had appeared to relish the trappings of the papacy, now lives in a secluded residence in the Vatican gardens. He entertains few visitors and refrains from any declarations, according to Zenit.

On Sunday, he took took his first day trip out of the Vatican, walking in the gardens at the papal summer residence at Castel Gandolfo.